A pretty big news round up day, as we have a lot of news to share plus fun things like contest winners and our Deathwing kill video.

First and foremost, however, we have a job opening at Wowhead. It's always a huge honor to bring someone aboard our team and this time is no different. ZAM is growing and we've found ourselves in need of a Java Developer. If you have a lot of experience and know how to code, as well as have a strong passion for video games, you should look us up; after reading the requirements, just send your salary history and resume to jobs@wowhead.com if you're interested.

Deathwing Kill Video

I made this a few days ago for Tankspot--it's just me killing Deathwing on the final encounter of Dragon Soul from this week's PTR. I realized I never shared it, though!

A few words on the fight: first off, it's really fun. It looks boring when you see a video, because it's just generally boring to watch videos anyway; the gist of the fight is that you gain buffs, you have to dynamically jump to the platform, and then you have to engage Deathwing which removes your buff. After doing this four times, you face him and kill him.

It was fairly easy, but a GM talked with us directly and assured us they would be adding more difficulty in normal mode as well as heroic. He noticed us ignoring certain aspects to maximize DPS and being able to heal through it, so I'm sure they'll fix that.

There's also a cinematic that cues when he dies, however, it was a filler Cataclysm trailer at this point. So it's obvious he will have an awesome cinematic much like Lich King did after his final death.

Contest Winners

In other news, we had a really huge TCG contest last week as well as a quick giveaway for a few Blizzard store pets. It was a fun time to be the community manager this week--I love giving away free things!

We read almost every entry for the contest and tried to pick people who put creativity into their entries this time around as promised. As such, half our wins are random; the other half are merit based. Thanks for all the effort, even if you didn't win.

News Posts

Monk Class Color

Right now the monk is jade green. We like the color, but it's not absolutely set in stone. For those wondering how this would work with the hunter green, it's as different as the colors are for mages and shaman.

Zarhym on Redoing Tier Sets

i know it probably isn't one of the biggest concerns out there, but i was wondering if anyone knew if there was any plans to update the old gear to current graphics? I think it would be awsome...maybe not a top priority thing, but something to work on the side perhaps.

We don't have any plans to tamper with the art of existing tier sets. Transmogrification is being implemented, in part, to allow nostalgic players the option of wearing old gear without having to worry about the stats anymore. But, we don't want to go back and actually alter those looks. That'd almost defeat the purpose, especially given we'd prefer to focus our time on designing new sets to allow for more customization options (including aesthetic, stat-less sets to be used solely for Transmogrification).

The art and animation teams are incredibly busy, and sometimes I feel they don't get enough credit for the amount of work they do, or how much work is involved in each project. There are a number of projects on their list -- many of which players would love to see progress on -- but this isn't currently one of them that I'm aware of.

Progress on 4.3

We don't normally announce release dates for patches. I can say that we're still working on it and if you're interested in checking it out, it's available on the PTR. We have a lot of information out on the patch and are planning a nice little "round up" piece of information for the front page for those that may have missed some of the coverage.

WoW Annual Pass Extended to More Countries Such as Mexico

The World of Warcraft Annual Pass has been expanded to include more countries and is now available in Russia, Switzerland, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Chile and more.*

For a limited time only, players who make a 12-month subscription commitment to World of Warcraft through the WoW Annual Pass will receive the following epic rewards:

Diablo III FREE – Download the digital version via Battle.net for free when the game launches. This is the full game, not a trial edition.

Tyrael’s Charger WoW Flying Mount – Ride for the Archangel of Justice on all current and future characters on a single World of Warcraft account. Tyrael’s Charger will arrive via in-game mail with the upcoming launch of patch 4.3.

Access to the Next WoW Expansion Beta Test – Get a guaranteed spot in the beta test for the next World of Warcraft expansion (at a time to be announced in the future).

Sign up for the World of Warcraft Annual Pass here, and then keep an eye on the World of Warcraft community site or the Diablo III community site for future announcements regarding the launch dates of these bonuses.

For more information on this offer, including eligibility requirements and details on how the World of Warcraft Annual Pass applies to players who plan to purchase the Diablo III: Collector’s Edition, please read the full FAQ.

Patch 4.3 - PTR Build 14942 - Spell Changes

There's a small PTR patch that just hit the servers. The biggest news seems to be that potions were updated to be cheaper as well as more effective.

Comments

Comment by Fredrick

I like the thought and i really hope they are gonna do it, but they will have to spend a lot of time Balancing this to not screw it up.

Comment by Interest

on Fri, 04 Nov 2011 17:31:41 -0500

Buffing the potion at the end of the espansion is not kinda late?

Better late than never. =)

Comment by casedistorted

on Sat, 05 Nov 2011 03:39:13 -0500

wow i didn't win a single goddamn thing...thanks wowhead. and if i had known you were choosing half of your dang winners based on what they were actually saying I would have put more thought into my comment -_- gg wowhead gg

Comment by Almateri

on Sat, 05 Nov 2011 05:17:13 -0500

That "Tentacle"-fight really is a bid of an disappointment... and I can undersand the comment of Nymrohd about the feelings of a tank :/

It should be pretty clear that the death-animation is a placeholder, anything other than that would be.... totall stupid.

Anyway, congrats to all the winners and @casedistorted: Haters gonna hate - get out!

Comment by Interest

on Sat, 05 Nov 2011 10:24:03 -0500

wow i didn't win a single goddamn thing...thanks wowhead. and if i had known you were choosing half of your dang winners based on what they were actually saying I would have put more thought into my comment -_- gg wowhead gg

Think about it from a regular user's point of view:

-People just make accounts for Wowhead, contribution very little to the site itself, but enter the contests for the shiny prizes.-Regulars (generally) at least do something for Wowhead. They at least put some time and effort to make themselves part of the community: someone well known.

While anyone has the right to enter the contest (as applicable), it is nice that for once merit actually matters. Be glad random users are still capable of winning stuff - at least 50% of the prizes, in fact!

Comment by DivineIxen

on Sat, 05 Nov 2011 16:44:01 -0500

:/ I hope its not going to be some kind of redemption cutscene...Deathwing is WAAAAAAAAY past the point of redemption, even more so then Arthas ever was.

I'd rather see him go down still cursing, insane, and believing how the world is still going to burn without him. Then all topped off with mad laughter before he gags his last breath.

Comment by Dreamlore

Comment by SadisticZombie

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:25:50 -0600

I'm not a huge fan of the way he died. it was so anti-climactic and just wasn't really all that stimulating. Now if her reared up and roared in pain then dramatically fell onto a cliff edge then bounced off. That would be a death animation I could watch :) This one, just doesn't do anything for me. I mean he just dissipated in a puff of smoke, how uncool for Deathwing.

Comment by Adamsm

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:26:36 -0600

I'm not a huge fan of the way he died. it was so anti-climactic and just wasn't really all that stimulating. Now if her reared up and roared in pain then dramatically fell onto a cliff edge then bounced off. That would be a death animation I could watch :) This one, just doesn't do anything for me. I mean he just dissipated in a puff of smoke, how uncool for Deathwing.

Placeholder.

Comment by lankybrit

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:35:11 -0600

Buffing the potion at the end of the espansion is not kinda late?And another IMPORTANT question, is inscription going to get all the recepies without have to farm level 80 istance for the book?Or we have to wait the next espansion for get this fixed=?

You can learn all of the glyphs from the Mastery Books through Northrend Research; the books just give you a free use.

Where did you read that? They said they were going to do it, but we don't know when, do we?

Cheers.

Comment by Adamsm

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:38:53 -0600

Where did you read that? They said they were going to do it, but we don't know when, do we?

Happened during a Cata patch; I was learning new glyphs on my scribe and was checking them against the Atlasloot list to make sure it was confirmed...and it was.

Comment by lankybrit

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:47:08 -0600

Where did you read that? They said they were going to do it, but we don't know when, do we?

Happened during a Cata patch; I was learning new glyphs on my scribe and was checking them against the Atlasloot list to make sure it was confirmed...and it was.

Thanks. I'll check tonight.

BTW: Why do we have these annoying scrollbars now? It's a if wowhead doesn't know how to format anymore.

Cheers.

Comment by Interest

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 12:57:53 -0600

Where did you read that? They said they were going to do it, but we don't know when, do we?

Happened during a Cata patch; I was learning new glyphs on my scribe and was checking them against the Atlasloot list to make sure it was confirmed...and it was.

Thanks. I'll check tonight.

BTW: Why do we have these annoying scrollbars now? It's a if wowhead doesn't know how to format anymore.

Cheers.

Get Premium =P

Comment by OverZealous

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 13:11:53 -0600

wow i didn't win a single goddamn thing...thanks wowhead. and if i had known you were choosing half of your dang winners based on what they were actually saying I would have put more thought into my comment -_- gg wowhead gg

You could always, I don't know, read the contest rules?

Comment by lankybrit

on Tue, 08 Nov 2011 13:30:53 -0600

Where did you read that? They said they were going to do it, but we don't know when, do we?

Happened during a Cata patch; I was learning new glyphs on my scribe and was checking them against the Atlasloot list to make sure it was confirmed...and it was.

Thanks. I'll check tonight.

BTW: Why do we have these annoying scrollbars now? It's a if wowhead doesn't know how to format anymore.

Cheers.

Get Premium =P

What, they deliberately changed it to be more annoying for non-premium?